Category Archives: Disney Dining

When we read the official announcement about the 2013 Food & Wine Festival menus, we did a double take. There were some surprising returns and additions to the Festival, but one Festival Marketplace booth was missing that we thought was a glaring omission. The Scandinavia marketplace will no longer be stationed just outside of the Norway pavilion, which makes Norway the only World Showcase pavilion whose cuisine will not be represented at the Festival at all.

The France marketplace booth is another that will see some changes for Epcot’s 2013 International Food & Wine Festival. My favorite for the last two years, the coq au vin, may be off the menu. A new boeuf bourguignon dish has been announced as its replacement. I’ll always have the memories (and the pictures).

We’re really excited to start planning for this year’s Food & Wine Festival, and the Festival Marketplace is always our favorite part of the event. We’re amped for this first look at the full menus. Below are the menus for each of the Festival Marketplace booths, along with some commentary and pictures from us.

We’re gearing up for a return to Epcot’s International Food & Wine Festival!

On our last visit to Walt Disney World, we carved out an afternoon to take a look around Disney’s new Art of Animation Resort. The sister resort to Pop Century is Walt Disney World’s newest value resort featuring three wings of family suites and a fourth wing of single rooms. While we didn’t stay there on this visit, we may do so one day just to have access to the largest pool on Disney property, and for a good reason to stop at their quick service food court, Landscape of Flavors.

I was a little bummed when I saw the changes coming to the South Korea booth for 2013’s Food & Wine Festival, so I knew that my next look back at 2012 had to be at that booth, and possibly the best item at last year’s festival. We’ll miss you, Lettuce Wrap.

When Danny and I lived in New Jersey, we had a very rigid first-day tradition for our Walt Disney World vacations. We would take the earliest flight we could out of whichever Metro-NYC airport was offering the best price and earliest arrival time. We would hightail it to the Magic Kingdom for the afternoon, then take an evening dinner at one of the signature restaurants on the monorail loop. Now that we live in Montana, our first day entails a lot more travel time and more chance for delays, so parks aren’t really part of the arrival-day equation anymore. That, paired with the $10 per person credit card hold for signature restaurant reservations, means that we now look for something much more casual and flexible for our arrival night dinner.

On our last Walt Disney World vacation, our first meal of the trip was dinner at Olivia’s Café. We were so pleasantly surprised by this unassuming spot at the Old Key West resort that we booked it again for the first dinner of our upcoming visit. Located in the Hospitality House at Old Key West, Olivia’s is a cozy café with a casual feel, adorned with beachy decor, postcards and photos of actual Disney Vacation Club members.

The Disney Curmudgeon is a weekly op-ed piece from your friendly Hyperion Papers admin staff. I use this space to publicly rant about things that bother me, sometimes about Disney Parks, sometimes about Disney entertainment, but usually about the online Disney community. Obviously my opinions do not reflect those of the Disney Corporation, and it would be presumptuous for me to think that Disney would even care about my lunatic ravings, but they should, on both counts. What follows is my honest assessment on a topic that I find irksome. The disclaimer: I will keep my columns PG-13, but there will be the occasional light profanity, and sometimes, I may even allude to something a bit lewd. If I offend you in any way, feel free to let me know in the comments, but I did give you fair warning.

This has been done before. If you’re reading this blog, you’ve probably made this list before. Heck, even I’ve made this list before (or started it, anyway), in the comments of Tom Bricker’s column on the same subject.

The only item on my grandma’s bucket list: to visit Disneyland with all the grandkids.

This is The List. Your Disney life list. Your personal running scavenger hunt of Disney experiences. The “Disney Bucket List”, if you will, although I’m not calling it that because I hope I complete my list much sooner than I do my life. Most of what I’d like to accomplish is fairly attainable. It doesn’t include things that are left only to chance and famous millionaires like staying in the Cinderella Castle Suite. My list is filled entirely with things that I can personally make happen, so it really shouldn’t take me all that long. That said, it’s easy to sink in to the same old habits, travel annually at the same time of year, and see and do your favorite things over and over rather than trying new experiences.

Many want to walk through an empty Magic Kingdom. I’ve come close, but not quite!

I’m putting it all out here because if I publish it, I have to do it, right?

The following piece will be a new weekly column on The Hyperion Papers where I, Danny, will express some disgruntled opinions about something Disney-related that I find irksome. Look for it every Monday evening, and feel free to drop me your opinion on my musings in the comments. I may even use it for fodder in future posts.